George Monbiot: "The Struggle Against Ourselves" (Climate march speech)

I want to take a moment to remind you of where we have come from.

For the first three million years of human history, we lived according to circumstance. Our lives were ruled by the happenstances of ecology. We existed, as all animals do, in fear of hunger, predation, weather and disease.

For the following few thousand years, after we had grasped the rudiments of agriculture and crop storage, we enjoyed greater food security, and soon destroyed most of our non-human predators. But our lives were ruled by the sword, the axe and the spear. The primary struggle was for land. We needed it not just to grow our crops but also to provide our sources of energy – grazing for our horses and bullocks, wood for our fires.

Then we discovered fossil fuels, and everything changed. No longer were we constrained by the need to live on ambient energy; we could support ourselves by means of the sunlight stored over the preceding 350 million years. The new sources of energy permitted the economy to grow – to grow sufficiently to absorb some of the people expelled by the previous era’s land disputes. Fossil fuels allowed both industry and cities to expand, which permitted the workers to organise and to force the despots to loosen their grip on power.

(...)

http://www.monbiot.com/archives/2005/12/05/the-struggle-against-ourselves/

Videos of the speakers are apparently available at this link (but my browser - Opera - doesn't seem to like it):
http://www.youtube.com/watch.php?v=N8T7DLlnbQY

An excellent book with more in depth discussion on the same topic.

One of the best parts of the book is the discussion of ancient cultures vs. modern cultures. Ancient cultures have a "we're all in this together" mindset. They live sustainably with the Earth, they value diversity & the world around them. They recognize their place in the natural world.

Modern cultures have a "you're with us or against us" mindset. They live beyond their means, they value conformity & they have extracted themselves from the world around them. They believe they can exist outside of the natural world.

I highly recommend this book!

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1400051576/qid=1133891396/sr=8-1/ref=pd_bbs_1/104-5792740-7358366?n=507846&s=books&v=glance

Quite sobering and "spot on."